September 24, 2015

Lady Gaga has been making some good press lately for her new single "Till It Happens To You", a song with a graphic video that doubles as a PSA for awareness of sexual assaults taking place on campus.

It's a great cause... no doubt about that. But there's one thing I just can't forget. Something that Lady Gaga and her fans would probably love to keep swept under the rug.

Just over a year ago, Lady Gaga wrote/created/filmed a music video for the second (out of three) official singles released from her third album, ARTPOP, which ultimately ended up getting cancelled. Probably for the best that it did, since many people were calling the video "literally an ad for rape".

According to Page Six (and US Weekly, and The Huffington Post, and many, MANY other sources), the video, directed by one alleged sexual predator and co-starring another, had scenes with a naked, unconscious Lady Gaga, who had scantily-clad dancers writhing on top of her, scenes of her touching herself and being touched...

...and creepy lines by R. Kelly like, "I’m putting you under, and when you wake up, you’re going to be pregnant," and when she asks him if she'll ever walk again (referring to the hip injury she had to cancel her Born This Way Ball Tour over), he says, "Yes, if you let me do whatever I want with your body."

GROSS.

"But wait," some of you may be saying. "Maybe she didn't write it."

Well, she released a statement herself, in her own words, on her own social networking site, saying that she did, when she apologized to her fans for it being late.

"It is late because, just like with the Applause video unfortunately, I was given a week to plan and execute it."

"I" was given a week to plan and execute it. "I" was. Not "my team", not "my team and I"... "I was". So yes, she did write it herself.

"At least she scrapped it before it was released, knowing how bad it was," you may then say.

NOPE!

She scrapped it because, according to a source at US Weekly, she just didn't like the finished product. The source states, "Everybody at the label actually loved it and it was NOT pulled because of Richardson and R. Kelly." And, "The truth is, Gaga herself didn't like it. She didn't love how it turned out and wouldn't let the label release it."

So, the next time someone in the media wants to call Gaga a "hero" or some other nonsense for standing up for victims of sexual assault, remind them what she was doing just over a year ago.

August 19, 2015

According to the Daily Mail, Lady Gaga's managed to get another magazine cover (somehow). She did an interview with them (CR Fashion Book) and actually said the following, presumably with a straight face:

"As a 29-year-old girl, at this stage in my pop career everybody goes, "Oh she's getting old," and everybody's so worried about having a perfect body, a perfect face, and perfect hair."

Have you ever seen one single article where anyone has ever said that about a 29-year old? Especially Gaga? Because I sure haven't. I guess this is one of those imaginary injustices she's always being subjected to, the poor thing.

"When, you know, actually, legacy and longevity is about having some sort of story and footprint to leave in the world when you die, chasing your talent until you're dead. And that, as an artist, you love your art 'til death."

Get it? She's more concerned with her music and her art than her looks? Sounds like another example of Gaga trying to convince us how much "deeper" she is than her peers. The real question is: why does she feel the need to drag others down?

"It's the antithesis of what I was taught growing up, which is that at this age I would have to fight in order to continue to look young, in order to continue to be trendy. When, you know, I never was trendy. I was always anti-trend."

August 4, 2015

Lady Gaga announced her upcoming fifth album yesterday on Instagram, and the announcement got less attention than a photo she took of a baked pasta dish the day before...

...despite the fact that Billboard, as well as several other major music news websites and blogs, have picked up the story and linked directly to her page.

What could this mean? Is Instagram simply not the best platform for a major announcement like an album, or are people just over her? Could people have been turned off so much by ARTPOP that they don't want to bother with LG5?

People really seem to be hoping for a pop sound after this little jazz era of hers... but with Gaga, who knows what she has planned.

July 13, 2015

Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett headlined the Gent Jazz Festival in Belgium yesterday. Apparently, there was a lot of hype about it since there had never been a celebrity as big as Gaga there before, but can hype sell tickets?

This article, when translated into English, wondered if the show was going to be "empty" since tickets had been on sale for over eight months and still weren't sold out by the time the article was published (on the tenth of July, so two days before the show).

Excuses being given for the poor ticket sales were: that the ticket prices were high (100 euro), that Werchter (Rock Festival) took place only a week before, that there was too much competition since there were free shows going on at the time as well, that Lady Gaga's fans wouldn't want to sit through a jazz show, and that Tony Bennett's fans wouldn't want to sit through a pop show.

So, what ended up happening? Was the show a success?

I don't know if it ended up selling out or not (though I have a guess), but this review gives the show a modest 3/5 stars.

Translated, the article asks, "did we get a good jazz show?"

They answer their own question with a straight "no".

Instead of jazz, they say they were presented with a "musical". They enjoyed Bennett's performance the whole way through, but only liked Gaga some of the time. Complaints were mostly about her belting when she didn't need to be, and about how the jazz bands playing with them, while talented, were basically forced to play a "Disney version" of the songs.

I guess this show was more of the same old thing that we've come to expect from Lady Gaga nowadays: hyped up mediocrity.

June 29, 2015

Lady Gaga spent some time yesterday afternoon on the balcony of her apartment in Chicago, overlooking the city and watching the first-ever Chicago Mariachi and Folklórico Festival, thinking it was the Chicago Pride Parade.

Little did Mother Moron know that the Pride Parade route was actually several miles north of there in a different neighborhood, well out of view of her balcony.

June 16, 2015

Lady Gaga performed during the opening ceremony for the first European Games in Azerbaijan on Friday. She played a boring rendition of John Lennon's "Imagine" on a piano covered with flowers.

Apparently, she hid out in a hotel for days to keep her presence at the Games a secret. Some sources say she faced criticism from her fans for showing up to this event at all, because of Azerbaijan's human rights record, but I have seen zero backlash or criticism of her performance anywhere. I'd ask if this was an example of media manipulation, but it doesn't seem like anyone's talking about this performance at all, good or bad.

In fact, Lady Gaga posted about it herself on Instagram, and that post got 73,000 less likes than a photo Miley Cyrus took of an avocado.

If that doesn't say something about Lady Gaga's current status as a pop star, I don't know what will.